1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to the field of telecommunication systems, and more particularly, to such systems which communicate with a device at a remote location regardless of the operating state of the system.
2. Description of the Related Art Including Information Disclosed Under 37 C.F.R. Section 1.97-1.99
Telecommunications systems employing a multiplexing multiport switch controlled by a central controlling unit for selectively interconnecting telephonic calls from external telephonic units with internal telephonic units of the telecommunication system are well known. Examples of such telecommunications systems are shown in patent application U.S. Ser. No. 07/770,197 of Jones et al. entitled "Multichannel Telephonic Switching Network With Different Signaling Formats and Connect/PBX Treatment Selectable For Each Channel", filed Oct. 2, 1991; U.S. Pat. No. 5,140,611 of Jones et al. entitled "Pulse Modulated Self-Clocking and Self-Synchronizing Data Transmission and Method for a Telephonic Communication Switching System", issued Aug. 18, 1992; U.S. Pat. No. 5,127,004 of Lenihan et al. entitled "Tone and Announcement Message Code Generator for a Telephonic Switching System and Method", issued Jun. 30, 1992 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,627,047 of Pitroda et al. entitled "Integrated Voice and Data Telecommunications Switching System", issued Dec. 2, 1986.
It is also known to access information in such telecommunications systems from a remote computer based device regardless of the operating state of the system. If the multiport switch of the telecommunication system is in an on-line state, a full-featured user interface is available for communication with the remote device. Since the computer controlled remote device is actively connected to the telecommunication system in the on-line state, it is free to access a vast amount of information and perform numerous capabilities on the system through a series of commands. However, in these known systems, if the computer controlled multiport switch is in an off-line state, the remote device is not actively connected to the switch, and thus the remote device has only minimal user interface communication capabilities with the telecommunication system. For example, if the telecommunication system is in an off-line state, the remote computer device is limited to only those capabilities associated with running a diagnostic test or performing recovery actions on the system.
In these known telecommunications systems in order to access the system from a remotely located computer controlled device regardless of the operating state of the system, the use of a software controlled multiplexing modem is required. A sophisticated multiplexing modem, or multiconnection modem, is needed in these known systems to provide access to different parts of the switch during the different states of operation of the switch. Disadvantageously, these software controlled multiplexing modems are complex devices which are very costly to the purchaser of the telecommunication system as compared to single connection modems.